How was yours?
Decided to go back to the beginning this morning having last night dug out my first 22 rimfire, a Czechoslovakia stamped Brno of early 60's Vintage.
Settling down beneath a wonky spruce I note a series of pale shapes about 120 yards away as I tighten into the leather rifle sling. Elbows comfy on knees I ignore what I assume to be newly stacked timber until the logs start moving!
Immediately I kick myself for a; - having my Zeiss 8X30's rather than Leica 15 power binos and b; - only a 22 rimfire at hand for what I'm looking at is the first fallow I've seen on my patch since last August and to make it worse there is 18 of them - 3 of which are pure white - my favourite!
I do my best to assess each one but struggle in the half-light with the small Zeiss but brightness aside what I really need is magnification as I'm convinced a number have escaped from a park and may have tags to confirm such. I resist the temptation to track them with the compact Burris rimfire scope.
At 07:15hrs precisely they melt back into the wood and as the last horse shoe marking disappears a squirrel jumps up accommodatingly onto some fallen timber no more than 40 yards away. The CCI sub-sonic takes the old boy through the shoulders with a resounding thwack. Can't be sure about the shadow but even in death he managed to momentarily grasp a branch after falling 3ft before letting go and landing between two young wind-felled beech.
The only other shot I get is at a rabbit at c60 yards with help from a single stick. Very satisfying though as only it's head visable and with need to thread bullet through one or two obstacles.
Back to basics. Back to the beginning. And back tomorrow with something beginning with "K"!
Decided to go back to the beginning this morning having last night dug out my first 22 rimfire, a Czechoslovakia stamped Brno of early 60's Vintage.
Settling down beneath a wonky spruce I note a series of pale shapes about 120 yards away as I tighten into the leather rifle sling. Elbows comfy on knees I ignore what I assume to be newly stacked timber until the logs start moving!
Immediately I kick myself for a; - having my Zeiss 8X30's rather than Leica 15 power binos and b; - only a 22 rimfire at hand for what I'm looking at is the first fallow I've seen on my patch since last August and to make it worse there is 18 of them - 3 of which are pure white - my favourite!
I do my best to assess each one but struggle in the half-light with the small Zeiss but brightness aside what I really need is magnification as I'm convinced a number have escaped from a park and may have tags to confirm such. I resist the temptation to track them with the compact Burris rimfire scope.
At 07:15hrs precisely they melt back into the wood and as the last horse shoe marking disappears a squirrel jumps up accommodatingly onto some fallen timber no more than 40 yards away. The CCI sub-sonic takes the old boy through the shoulders with a resounding thwack. Can't be sure about the shadow but even in death he managed to momentarily grasp a branch after falling 3ft before letting go and landing between two young wind-felled beech.
The only other shot I get is at a rabbit at c60 yards with help from a single stick. Very satisfying though as only it's head visable and with need to thread bullet through one or two obstacles.
Back to basics. Back to the beginning. And back tomorrow with something beginning with "K"!
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